


A Spoonful of Sugar

by kikuhikous



Category: Banana Fish (Anime & Manga)
Genre: Baking, Domestic Fluff, M/M, Pining Ash Lynx
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-10
Updated: 2019-02-10
Packaged: 2019-10-25 09:44:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,387
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17722799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kikuhikous/pseuds/kikuhikous
Summary: sharp quips from soft mouths. funfetti and vanilla. ash realizes just how deeply he's fallen.





	A Spoonful of Sugar

**Author's Note:**

> because the world knows these boys deserve only the softest warmest golden afternoon together.

“And I need to make sure everything’s perfect,” he says. “I  _want_  to, I mean. But if you’re not –”  
  
“Okay, Ash,” Eiji says, holding out his hands. Ash bristles and slumps back onto the sofa, disappearing into the cushions. “You must relax, yes? We cannot plan something so fun if you are – when you make that face.”  
  
He relaxes his features into passive neutrality. “What face?”  
  
Now Eiji bristles, and Ash hides his own smile at the way his nose wrinkles. Eiji points to his forehead. “Your eyebrows,” he says. “They–” He pinches his own brows together. “Like that! Not good. You will look like old man.”  
  
Ash tilts his head, but his smile is a smirk now. “Like Ibe-san?”  
  
“Ash!” he sputters. He loves how Eiji manages to turn one syllable into two. His lips rounding to breathe out that whoosh of air at the end.   
  
“Yes?”  
  
Eiji sighs. Whatever he was going to say is clearly not important anymore, though he can still see it etched in his face. “It is nothing,” he says. He draws himself up to his full height and smiles. “So? What did you want to tell me? Before you started–what does Shorter say– _going off?_ ”   
  
Ash blinks, and blinks again – and flits his gaze away as his cheeks tingle. Something so mundane shouldn’t feel so … shouldn’t feel like this, but there is something intimate about an outsider picking up on the particularities of his language. Eiji speaking English–with his extreme formalities and long pauses–is one thing, but this sort of informal language is an extra mile he finds endearing. To not even having fully mastered one, and already going for the other –  
  
“Just–just that you don’t have to take it on yourself if you don’t want to,” he mutters.

Now Eiji blinks, tilting his head. “What are you …” The rest of his words die in a sputter when he laughs. Eyes squeezing shut, lips widening, teeth flashing. Ash notices the creases in the corners of his eyes. “Oh, Ash,” he says pointedly, with a little hiccup. Another giggle bursts from his throat. “You are talking about the cake? Really?”

“It’s a tall order.” Eiji’s grin widens.  _Goddamn it_. “Like, literally–”

“Look at you. You are being so silly right now. You think I cannot make a cake?” He folds his arms with a small pout. “I am hurt.”

“That’s not what I –”

“Oh, hush.” Eiji crosses the space between them and clumsily pats his cheek.  The points of his fingertips burn against his skin. “You are so foolish sometimes, Ash Lynx. Even though you are so smart.”

Ash jerks back from his touch and throws a pillow at him. “Get out,” he mumbles, as Eiji laughs all over again. The pillow goes flying over his shoulder, arching through the air. 

He jabs him in the shoulder, and then his chest. “I cannot do cool jumps and flips like you, Ash, but I think I am better than you at making cakes.”

“Sure,” he says. Sinking deeper into the couch. “Whatever. I’m going to nap.”

“You  _always_  say that.”

“Well, I’m tired.”

“Little baby.” He sticks out his tongue.

_Babies are always little_. Ash sticks his out right back at him. “You know the drill,” he says, shifting to lie on his back. The pillows sag against him when he throws his arm up over his eyes. 

“Yes, yes,” He says airily, voice floating across the room. He is already walking away, soft footsteps getting fainter and fainter. “Two hours. I will wake you in two hours.”

He rolls over on his side and exhales, loosening his limbs. “Thanks, Eiji.” Maybe he’ll ask Shorter later to press his shoulders, knead out all the knots there. In the warm throes of haziness, he faintly wonders if Eiji knows how to – he wouldn’t be surprised if he did. 

His hands on his bare skin, soft palms moving over his stiff shoulders, the heat from his body coursing over him in gentle waves –

Gentle, everything about Eiji is so gentle – 

A  _crash_  sounds through the room. Bolting up, hand going to his hip, he watches for a few numb seconds as Eiji crouches over to pick up a pan.

How mundane. How insignificant. He almost cannot believe this is the source of the sound – a sound he has heard his whole life as meaning danger and alarm, panic and fear.

Eiji looks up and smiles sheepishly. “Whoops!”

Ash sighs heavily, fingers uncurling. His hand comes back up to rest in his lap. “Why stop there? We have a whole cabinet full of pans.” His head is pounding; so close, he was so close to sleep, he could taste it. “In fact, just drop them all on my head while you’re at it.”

Eiji wrinkles his nose at him in disgust. “ _Yeesh_. I see why you have no friends now.” He mutters something under his breath in Japanese, too faint and too foreign for Ash to make out. “You really are just like baby. So angry when you wake from nap.”

“I was almost there,” he retorts, but Eiji has already turned away with a  _hmph_. “What are you doing, anyway?”

He slams a cabinet shut. Glass rattles. “I am finding more pans to drop on your head. What  _else_  would I be doing?”

Ash collapses back onto the cushions with a sigh.  _Now who’s being the baby?_  A sudden thought has him scrambling back up, but warily. He hasn’t really – he doesn’t really know this kind of stuff, but –

“Hey, Eiji.” Sleep is already siphoning out of his head. Maybe another time, then. “If you want, I can – I can help.”

Another  _hmph_. A cloud of white puffs out as Eiji slams a bag of flour onto the counter. He doesn’t even blink as it billows in his face. “No need. After all, Ash Lynx is only good with guns and cars. Like–Like–that Pond someone–”

“Bond?” Ash says. “James Bond?”

“You be quiet,” he snaps. “You just want compliment. Well, you are getting nothing! James Bond can look cool and show off, and I am sure he is also like little baby, so angry after waking up. But he cannot cook.” The fridge door slams shut. Eiji crosses the counter and holds up a knife menacingly; Ash has to cough into his elbow. He can’t help but conjure up an image of a rubber ducky. “He does not know  _real life skills_.”

Laughter bubbles and fizzes in his stomach. So close to spilling out of his throat. It escapes in a little half scoff, half chortle. “Are you trying to, like, offend me, Eiji? Because A+ for effort. It’s really cute.”

Eiji pulls back his arm; the tip of the blade glints in the overhead fluorescent light. “I will throw this at your pretty face, Ash Lynx,” he sputters. Now Ash smiles for real. “And then what will you do?”

He crosses his arms over the top of the couch and leans forward, resting his head on his elbows. Gazing at Eiji, he asks, “You think I’m – my face is pretty?”

“Now you are just fishing for compliments. You really are just like small child.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“There is nothing to say.”

His fingers twitch. “But there is. You were gonna throw that knife at my pretty face, weren’t you, Eiji?”

“ _Were_? I am still considering it,” he says, with a little triumphant grin down at his mixing bowl. There is something in the furrow of his brows, in the set of his jaw, in the little fire lacing his words – Ash’s pulse jumps strangely. Longingly. “So you watch your mouth, okay?”

“Okay,” he whispers.

He doesn’t remember sliding off the couch, or walking into the kitchen, except that he blinks and the fluorescent light is flickering off the marble counter and his warm feet are on cool tiles. 

How small Eiji suddenly looks, mixing bowl clutched to his chest. His hair sticks out in tufts. A dab of batter is on his nose. “You are here, at least,” he says, looking him up and down as though he might sprout another head in the next few seconds. “What will you do? Bite my ear off?”

A sudden image flits through his head, unbidden, secret and too warm and too close. His stomach tingles. “What?”

The bowl slips for a second as Eiji fumbles, muttering under his breath; clutching it securely under his arm, he holds out on hand, fingers snapping open and shut. “You will … jabber, yes? Like you always do? About– _condensation_?”

His shoulders slump in a small chortle. “Caramelisation,” he huffs.

“Yes, yes–” Eiji waves a hand, turning back to his bowl, which he’s set on the counter. “That.” He then turns to peer at the fridge, at the printout he’s stapled there. “Three eggs … half cup cocoa … that word gives me nightmare, Ash. Too long and too scary.”

“Cocoa?”

“ _Quiet_. You know exactly what I am talking about.”

“But I’ve been  _jabbering_  about it to you for the past two weeks.”

“Yes, well? You think I am listening? I am busy. Busy measuring and mixing and making sure nothing burns. And all  _you_  do is lean on the counter with your bum and try to look cool. But you are just nerd! Con–Caramelsion this, caramelsion that …”

Ash doesn’t have the heart to correct him. He can even see the way Eiji’s chest puffs up a little in small pride. 

Something sweet and warm rushes through his own chest for a moment, so pure and untainted that he closes his eyes and rocks on his feet, letting himself float on that feeling alone.

When he at last opens his eyes, Eiji is in the middle of cracking a second egg. But he doesn’t fully crack it – he carefully separates both halves and starts pouring their contents into each other. 

“What are you doing?” he asks, intrigued. Yolk glimmers as Eiji transfers it from one cracked shell to another, while the white drips down into a small bowl. “What’s that for?”

“I only need the white,” he says. Then – “And  _you_  can eat  _this_. So yummy, yes, Ash? Good for muscles, too–”

Their bare feet slip and slide on the counter; Ash barely dodges his flying arm. His hip bangs against the counter as he wards him off with his remaining strength, still zapped from sleep. “Get that  _away_  from me, Eiji–”

But he’s laughing, and they’re both laughing, somehow, and somehow he’s managed to grab onto Eiji’s wrists and Eiji’s gotten close enough for him to smell the butter and vanilla on his clothes, his hair. 

Ash loosens his grip, but Eiji doesn’t move. He can see the flush on his cheeks, the way his lashes fan out, can count all of those lashes, one by one by one–

The  _beep_  of the timer has Eiji jumping out of his grasp. Ash brings his arms back to his sides; his fingers twitch faintly. 

“Ash?” How casually he says his name, as though they weren’t just standing a breath away from each other. “Can you grease that pan for me?”

So he does. Grabs the stick of butter and smears it all over the bottom and sides of the pan. Maybe he needs this distraction – maybe Eiji noticed, like he notices everything. And does it again, two more times, for the other two pans. 

Realization dawns on him when he’s halfway through with the third one.

_This is boring as hell_ , he thinks – and smiles to himself.  _No wonder he asked me to do it._

He asks Eiji to let him help with the actual work.

“Why? So you can make funfetti cakes for your gang? That is so sweet.” He pauses, hand on his chin. “Maybe that is not so bad idea. It will be good if you know how to make your own food.”

“I just want you to get your work done faster, dumbass,” Ash says, rapping his knuckle against the side of his head.  _So we can do other things_. “Besides, we can’t just live off funfetti cakes. You know how to make any real food?”

Eiji slowly turns from where he’s mixing; something sly and evil curls his lips upward, glints in his eyes.  _Oh god, no. Please, no_. He already knows what he’s going to say, just like he knows the words of some long-forgotten song.  “Natto,” he says.

_Oh, fuck_. 

“I can make all kinds of natto for you, Ash. And for the rest of your gang. We can have natto everyday for the rest of our lives. Mmm, delicious and nutritious. You agree, yes?”

“I agree that your use of two adjectives right after each other without stuttering is impressive,” he mumbles. His stomach is already crawling at the thought of the fermented bean dish – he’d had it only once, and never again. 

“What?” Eiji pulls out a spatula from the drawer before looking up to frown at him. “Stop mumbling. I cannot hear you. And I am only joking about natto, you know.”

He only mixes for a few moments before slowly turning back to him. 

“I am … not very good at teaching,” he says, a little sheepishly. “Well, not in English, anyway.” He straightens for a moment and turns to smile. It’s the brightest thing in the kitchen, especially since the flickering fluorescent light isn’t doing much. “But … I do think it will be nice if you know how to make cakes. Everyone likes sweets, yes? You will be even more popular than you already are.” Something rustles in his stomach, something hot and pulsing and secret. “So you can watch me, okay?” 

His eyes go to his rolled up sleeves, exposing the lean and smooth skin of his forearms. To the hollow at the base of his throat, to the jet-black hair sticking out in tufts behind his ears, to the warm brown of his eyes, so warm and so brown he feels as though if he takes one step out of place he’ll get lost in them forever.

_I can watch you._ There it is again, that strange longing in his pulse. Heat blossoms over his cheeks, two drops of tingling warmth _. I can watch you forever._

Ash smiles. “Okay.”


End file.
